Mother of Eden

Mother of Eden certainly wasn't a bad book, not bad at all. Still, I have to say it's a far cry from the first book, which I absolutely adored.

First, it's important to know that Mother of Eden isn't exactly a direct follow-up to Dark Eden, taking place roughly five or six generations in the future. Be aware that if you are thinking of reading it as a stand-alone though, you'll miss out on a lot of the background information in the first book. Remember how I'd ended my review ofDark Eden with the theory that characters like John Redlantern, Tina, Gerry and Jeff would eventually become the stuff of legends to their descendants, much like how "First Couple" Angela and Tommy became revered by Family? Turns out that is exactly the case, so it wouldn't hurt to be familiar with the events of book one.

Still, the world of Eden has changed a lot since John Redlantern first destroyed Circle of Stones and took his supporters away from Circle Valley and over Snowy Dark. There are now thousands of humans living across the planet, divided into two main groups: Johnfolk, those who were descended from John and his followers; and Davidfolk, descendants of those who remained with the original Family led by David, John's greatest rival. There are quite a few offshoot populations as well, and our protagonist Starlight Brooking is a young woman from one such tribe, a member of the Kneetree Folk who live on a tiny island far away from the hustle and bustle of the rest of Eden.

But Starlight has always wanted something more out of her life than just catching fish and making boats. She convinces her uncle, brother and a couple friends one day to travel with her to Veeklehouse, a kind of trading port where many of Eden's tribes converge to buy and sell their goods. There she meets handsome Greenstone Johnson, a Johnsfolk man from across Greatpool who came in his colorful wraps and mighty sail boats to trade his shiny metal. Greenstone is drawn to Starlight right away and asks her to return with him to his home of Edenheart, and sensing her chance for a great adventure, she agrees. After all, Greenstone isn't just a descendent of John, he's the great-great-grandson of John himself, and is a prince of sorts among his people. Starlight is even more excited when she discovers that as Greenstone's "Housewoman", she'll get to wear the legendary Gela's Ring and take on the mantle of Mother of Eden.

As she soon discovers though, living in Greenstone's home of New Earth isn't all it's cracked up to be. In fact, life is downright unpleasant if you're not one of the "Big People", and even "Small People" make themselves feel bigger by pressing semi-intelligent creatures into slave labor. If you're a Batface or have any other type of physical or mental deformity, you're immediately relegated to the lowest rungs of society and it's the metal digs for you! Greenstone himself isn't a bad guy, but his father the Headman as well as Edenheart's Chiefs and Teachers will throw you to the Fire if your beliefs deviate from the "correct" version of history, and if you're a woman you'll have no say in how Edenheart is run because your opinion means nothing.

This is how Starlight quickly realizes that even though she is the Ringwearer and the beloved Mother of Eden, she actually holds little to no power at all. And that is NOT all right with her, and neither are all of New Earth's injustices. Starlight's character is probably my favorite part of this book; she plays a similar role to John Redlantern's from the first book, but for one key difference to me: while both John and Starlight are initiative-taking people who are constantly seeking something more, John sought glory only for himself, versus Starlight whose ultimate goal was to better the lives of others. Huge respect. I found myself rooting for her every step of the way.

Now for the book's not-so-great parts. Like Dark Eden, it carries on its commentary on the evolution of civilization and culture, language, religion, etc. But whereas the social-fiction elements in the first book were more understated and nuanced, Mother of Edenhas a clear message and it is delivered with the subtlety and grace of a wrecking ball. Never mind that I agreed with and admired Starlight for everything she tries to do for New Earth, like fighting to give better quality-of-life for Small People and a voice to women, or the fact that I loved this book for its heartfelt attempt to honor the role of motherhood and the power of a mother's love. All that's fine and good but only when it doesn't affect the quality of writing or give rise to frequent character actions and dialogue choices that feel incredibly awkward or out-of-place. Too bad that in this case, I felt it did.

My biggest problem with Mother of Eden though was the ending. Even if I hadn't found it unsatisfying - and it really was off-putting - I still probably wouldn't have enjoyed it. The thing is, "unsatisfying" endings I can live with, but "incomplete" is a whole other matter. Unfortunately, everything after the climax felt rushed and not entirely all there, with multiple skips of varying degrees in time and a lot of important events happening off the page. Up until that point, the author had more or less kept us in the loop with what's happening across multiple locations by giving us a wide range of character perspectives. But when it came to the ending where it really mattered, the scope narrowed so much that I was left wondering what happened to a major character, whose fate was only then mentioned in passing in one of the final chapters in Afterwords section (and I felt that character totally deserved to be handled better than that).

Maybe a sequel to Dark Eden really wasn't needed, but nevertheless I'm not sorry I read the book. It was fascinating to see what Eden has become. If Chris Beckett were to write a third Eden book I would likely still read it. Hopefully it would redeem that disheartening ending.